Detroit's happy old year

DETROIT — Chrysler's December U.S. sales rose 6 percent, Ford's edged up 1.8 percent and General Motors' fell 6.3 percent as the industry wrapped up its best overall year since 2007.

Comment

By Brent Snavely

southcoasttoday.com

By Brent Snavely

Posted Jan. 4, 2014 at 12:01 AM

By Brent Snavely
Posted Jan. 4, 2014 at 12:01 AM

» Social News

DETROIT — Chrysler's December U.S. sales rose 6 percent, Ford's edged up 1.8 percent and General Motors' fell 6.3 percent as the industry wrapped up its best overall year since 2007.

Big year-end holiday sales in December helped all automakers. But the industry's sales gains for the month are coming in weaker than expected. Stronger-than-normal sales in November, combined with unusually colder weather and big snowstorms, may have put a damper on industry sales for the month.

"Coming off of Black Friday, we saw more Black Friday activity across the entire industry than we ever have," said Kurt McNeil, GM's vice president of U.S. sales operations.

Ford sales analyst Erich Merkle said December was a difficult month for passenger car sales. December is typically a big sales month for pickups and luxury cars.

Still, sales for the year are expected to be about 15.6 million vehicles, according to several forecasts.

Chrysler said it sold 161,007 new cars and trucks in December as its all-new Jeep Cherokee had another impressive month for sales. Chrysler sold 15,038 Cherokees in the second full month the new SUV has been in showrooms, helping the Jeep record a 34 percent increase from December 2012.

Ford's December sales were helped by a 27 percent increase in Ford Fusion sales. Sales of the Fiesta slipped 20.2 percent, and Focus sales tumbled 31 percent from a year earlier.